Cogitamus

Talk Amongst Yourselves - Open Thread (with a side of Glam)

"Virginia Plain" - Roxy Music

Sherman, set the WABAC Machine to England in 1972 -- and watch the Brians -- Ferry and Eno -- create that glam magic of yesteryear.  Note Eno's little homemade looking synthesizer and sequined gloves -- and really, really bad hair. 

Ran out of steam on the post on which I was working.  Hopefully will finish tomorrow.  And it is completely free of any Yglesias bashing. 

Immigration, Wages, Yglesias, and Me Redux

So Matt countered my (slightly snotty) argument regarding the actually deleterious impact of undocumented workers on the wages of construction workers in the basic trades with his own (slightly counter-snotty) post that he "lives in the world in which we address complicated questions with scientifically valid research methods."  He then continues to rely entirely on this paper by a University of Chicago economist that is, to put it kindly, abstract in the extreme, to support his assertions.  My actual day to day experiences with the phenomenon are evidently not complex enough.

A couple of thoughts -- one, at the risk of sounding slightly anti-intellectual, I am really not one to subscribe to every bullshit theory that comes from the Economics Department at UChicago.  It seems to me that if these folks were right about everything, we would be enjoying an era of unprecedented prosperity following thirty years of right wing economic policy.  Second, as bright as I think Yglesias is, I doubt very much that he has fully read and understood Professor Cortes's paper.  (Or perhaps I'm projecting.)  In other words, I think he is relying on an authority whose conclusion he agrees with to support an argument that he really has no experience with nor expertise in.  We all do this from time to time I suspect, but it doesn't really impress me.  

Matt really addresses my rhetoric and not my underlying argument, which is based on actual, ugly confrontations with the reality of a specific market place.  He also seems to misunderstand the nature of the group that I am addressing here -- they are not low-skilled, low wage, high school dropouts, but rather skilled workers who are typically high school graduates who have gone through a three or four year apprenticeship program.  They have also enjoyed pretty respectable hourly wages and benefits.  And their wages appear to be ready to crater as a result of unscrupulous employment practices that take advantage of undocumented workers. 

Now I am not basing this on an amateur's observations or a dilettante's speculations.  As I noted in the first post, I have just been through a process over the last year in which three different collective bargaining agreements were opened up mid-term -- a very rare thing -- in order to negotiate wage cuts, despite the fact that the employees had already secured modest wage increases for the remainder of the agreements.  These cuts progressed, depending on when the negotiations took place, from the earliest to the latest from 7% to 12% to 30%.  In all of these trade and geographic jurisdictions, the competition occurs from contractors employing a primarily undocumented work force.  How do I know this?  Well, for one, I've been involved in organizing campaigns at a couple of the employers where my clients were able to either win an NLRB election or get a majority of employees to sign cards, yet were unable to secure a contract.  As I also noted, I've represented several non-union drywall installers in cases where they were being treated as phony independent contractors and not being paid overtime. 

Additionally, my office represents hundreds of thousands of union members in all fifty states.  We represent both the basic trades and the more highly skilled mechanical and electrical trades in a variety of places   As a result, I have a pretty intimate knowledge of what market conditions are like in both of these realms and what the impact of competition from the undocumented workers has been like on the basic trades and how they have fared relative to their more highly-skilled brethren.  Finally, my firm represents in some form or fashion the vast majority of building trades unions in the DC metropolitan area. 

But evidently resort to my own experience is not enough and I need to be bolstered by PhDs with incomprehensible mathematical formulas (or is it formulae?).  

Well, so fucking be it -- here is the abstract to the page turning paper "Immigration and Construction: An Analysis of the Impact of Immigration and Construction Project Costs."  I laid out $30 for the actual paper -- curse you, you trust fund scumbag -- but there is no price too dear to pay in the interest of being proven right.  I don't think I can post it here, however, without infringing on the rights of its authors. (I will email it to Matt.) The paper was produced by Sabrina Golden and Miroslaw Skibniewski, two academics at the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Maryland and prepared in order to address the possible effect on wages and project costs in the Washington DC metropolitan area if the amount of immigrant labor were dramatically decreased and employers were forced to hire native born workers as a result.  The intended audience is construction executives.  The paper was posted on February 4, 2010.  It is, in sum, current, addressed to the specific labor market to which I was referring, and written in pretty clear language, fancy mathematical formulas notwithstanding.

Let me lay out in basic terms what the study finds without violating any fair use of the paper.  The study finds that of the approximately 11 million illegal immigrants in the U.S., that 19% of them are working in the construction industry and that they comprise 14% of the overall construction work force.  It further finds that in the basic trades in the Washington DC metropolitan region, i.e. "concrete, masonry, drywall, painting, flooring, and roofing are comprised of approximately 55% illegal immigrants."  The paper also finds that nationally "illegal immigrants make up one-third of insulation workers, roofers, and drywall installers, and one quarter of all construction laborers, masons, painters, cement and concrete workers, and carpet and tile installers." These are pretty staggering numbers -- none of which are addressed by the Cortes study on which Yglesias relies.  The authors note that the DC construction market has far more illegal workers than the national market and that, as a result this compounds "the immigration effect on workers' wages." 

Open Thread: Marley's got a brand new bag, and how 'bout that healthcare summit?

I was just holding it for a friend, I swear!

In which I call Bullsh*t on Yglesias

As you know, I am generally a fan of Matt Yglesias.  He is a very smart and prolific guy, but sometimes his lack of actual real world experience catches up with him.  This post on illegal immigration in which he tries to argue that undocumented workers have little negative effect on the wages of the workers with whom they compete is one such instance.   (Ezra is quite wrong about this too.)

How do I know that I am right and Yglesias is wrong?:  Well, perhaps because I live in the actual world of people who work with their hands for a living (Matt probably knows a waiter or two) and I have seen the incredible damage that those who employ and exploit illegal immigrants have done to the labor markets in which my clients operate.  In those areas of the construction market in which undocumented immigrants from Mexico and Central America form a substantial amount of the available work force -- brick laying, tile setting, drywall installation, cement finishing, pipe insulating, and some aspects of carpentry and iron working -- wages barely increased during the incredible construction boom of the late 1990s through 2007.  My clients struggled to obtain even cost of living type increases despite full employment and in some instances, labor shortages.  Now that the construction market has gone bust, the massive presence of this easily exploitable work force is just destroying the market for labor in these craft areas.  In the past year, I have negotiated wages cuts of $2, $4, and $12 -- yes, $12 -- an hour for various groups with whom I work.  And no, none of these guys was getting rich to begin with -- they had wage and benefit packages of between $28 and $32 an hour, enough to put about $21--26 an hour in their pockets and to have decent health coverage and modest pensions.

In these trades, if you could secure 2,000 hours of work a year (not always easy in weather sensitive trades), you would make $40,000 to $52,000 a year -- a bit better if you could secure some decent overtime.  (Overtime at time and a half is generally paid for more than eight hours a day or Saturday work, with double time on Sundays and holidays.)  So essentially one could have a modestly middle class lifestyle with these wages and benefits, assuming you could find reasonably priced housing, which can be a challenge here. 

Employers using undocumented workers in these trades are typically paying them from $10 to $16 an hour and treating them (illegally) as independent contractors.  In other words, no benefits, no tax withholding, no Social Security, no workers' compensation, no unemployment insurance, and, of course, no overtime.  (And yes, I've brought lawsuits on behalf of such workers and seen this up close and personal as well.)

This is where you find yourself offering employers an $8 an hour wage cut, with an additional $4 cut off of the fringe benefits (leaving a subpar health plan and crappy pension benefits) and the employers telling you it is not enough. 

Basically, these labor markets have been destroyed by unscrupulous employers and a work force that is cowed into submission by its illegal status.  (A similar thing has happened in the meat packing industry.)  As a result, the prospects for a decent standard of living derived from these trades is rapidly receding. 

I am somewhat reticent about writing this sort of thing, because I never want to be identified with nativism or any hateful attack on immigrant labor.  I understand that these guys (and they are all men) are just trying to better themselves and their families.  They are not trying to harm anyone and I will never play the Lou Dobbs role and paint them as the enemy.  My clients continue to try to organize them, but they are a difficult group, particularly given the fact that the U.S. Supreme Court has stripped them of any labor law rights.  (I am very much in favor of immigration reform to try and ameliorate this problem.)  

But please, don't tell me that they are not bringing down wages for other workers.  It's just not so. 

Rep. Anthony Weiner: We are going to solve this problem...DEAL WITH IT!

The Republican party is a wholly-owned subsidiary of the insurance industry...

They can try to erase his words--as if the medium you're interacting with right now did not exist!--and they can keep sending him to the corner as though he'd just irritated Sister Mary Evangeline by chewing gum in algebra. But they can't silence this guy, and thank your deity of choice for that.

May I just add my own hearty Hear, hear to the many who are already praising Congressman Weiner's powerful words today. How I wish we had forty more Democrats like Anthony Weiner and Alan Grayson.

(H/T Toast)

Nineties Flashback and Open Thread

"Connection" - Elastica

I was reading a "where have they gone" article in Spin Magazine and among the featured was Justine Frischmann, Iead singer of Elastica, who has now become an abstract painter and has taken up with a professor from UC Davis fer chrissakes!  Next thing I know it will be Courtney Love explaining that she gave up heroin so that she could hang out with ari and listen to him lecture on who was our greatest president.  Or even worse, maybe Cerys Matthews (for all you britpop fans) would be crooning to him in Welsh.   

Anyway, Justine, labor lawyers are way hotter than academics from the edge of the American west.  Trust me. 

And at Corvus's request, consider this an open thread.  Your blogosphere dollar goes a long way at the Cogblog.  We give the peoples what they wants.

Off to prep for an arbitration. 

How to fail to reform the Senate without touching the filibuster

Ezra's most recent tab dump has a link which, in his blog, reads "How to reform the Senate without touching the filibuster."  Unfortunately, none of the ideas are a fraction as useful as getting rid of the filibuster would be.

Mack McLarty urges an end to anonymous 'holds.'  Holds, in and of themselves, are a consequence of the existing Senate rules, so if you're going to change the rules, you might as well kill the filibuster itself.  But the anonymity of the hold is Senate custom which could be overturned by the Majority Leader at any time.

I'd be all for this; I just don't see what good it would do.  The GOP isn't going to stop blocking nominations and whatnot just because a little more daylight is shed on the process; it's not like they feel any shame about their obstructionism.  They'd still place holds; we'd just know who was doing it.  BFD.

Norman Ornstein wants to change the Senate's culture by requiring them to spend 5 days a week in D.C., taking one week off out of every four to visit their 'home' state.

The resistance to this is obvious: Senators want to be seen as living in their home states, not in D.C.  If they're maintaining their primary residence inside or near the Beltway, with their kids are in D.C.-area schools, the 'out of touch with (state)' arrow will never be absent from a challenger's quiver.  So: not gonna happen.

And again, I doubt it would do much good if it did.  Remember the Gang of Six from last summer?  All the fraternizing in the world didn't change the willingness of a Grassley to savage the Democrats' health care reform proposals in ways that had little to do with the actual policy proposals.  And Grassley's one of the better ones.

Mark Penn...oh, forget it.  Why would anyone listen to Mark Penn?

OK, he proposes instituting Question Time, in the manner of the British PM and Parliament.  That tradition would come to a quick end the next time we had a Republican President.  Hell, even with this President, one can see that the GOP (and likely even 'centrist' Dems) wouldn't bother showing up and having Obama run circles around what passes for ideas in their tiny brains.  So let's just forget it.

Warren Rudman wants publicly-financed elections.  I've long supported this idea, but I've got no illusions about its limitations.  GOP Senators support our plutocracy out of love, not for money; its main effect would be on 'centrist' pro-business, anti-estate tax Democrats.  (Or 'would have been,' given Citizens United.)  So it wouldn't change the underlying dynamic of a GOP hell-bent on doing what rich people and big corporations want it to do, and using the filibuster to block everything its true base doesn't want.

Two GWU poli-sci professors want a fast track for judicial nominations.  I'm with Hilzoy here: judicial nominations, which are for life, are the one thing that should be filibusterable if anything is, since such nominations can't be undone.  A fast track for the President's executive-branch nominees, on the other hand, would be beneficial.

But such a fast track would need to be established by statute or Senate rule, which can be filibustered.  Similarly, which positions require Senate confirmation is defined by statute, and removal of names from the list can be filibustered.  (Too bad the Senate didn't pare that list waaaaaay down before Scott Brown was elected.)

Dana Perino...why would anyone listen to her, either?  Mark Penn is a worthless excuse for a human being, but he does have a brain cell or two to rub together.  The same can't be said about Perino. 

Her great idea is to elect more women.  I'm all for this, but it's got nothing to do with the Senate's dysfunction.  When GOP women who aren't from solidly blue states show an inclination to work across the aisle, I'll give this idea some credence.

Rob Richie of FairVote wants to redo the Senate's fundamental role: "As is the international norm for upper houses, the Senate should only be able to delay legislation, force reconsideration and propose amendments, not block final action."  He acknowledges this would require a Constitutional amendment, but says we ought to think big.

Except that while ending the filibuster requires (at worst) a 2/3 majority of the Senate, revamping its role as he suggests would require 2/3 of the Senate, 2/3 of the House, and 38 state legislatures.

Let's just kill the filibuster, folks.

Plutocratic Paradise

This is a story that is not garnering nearly enough attention.  Now I know it is competing with important stories like Tiger Woods' apology and Ron Paul's big straw poll win, but still . . . .

The recent release by the IRS of 2007 data detailing the earnings and federal taxes paid by the top 400 households in the country was revelatory in the extreme.  These families averaged an astonishing $345 million in income for the year.  Perhaps even more amazingly, they paid an average federal tax rate of just 16.6% of their income.  In other words, they paid taxes at a rate comparable to what an individual earning $32,000 would have paid during that year.   

Now I was silly enough to feel fortunate about my 2007 -- after a combined four decades of work in our respective fields, a J.D., two Masters Degrees, a lot of hours and accumulated expertise, and a couple of lucky breaks in my law practice, my wife and I managed to earn roughly one-tenth of one percent of what the Fat 400 Families made.  Being chump wage earners, however, we paid 30% of our income in federal taxes. 

I am not so churlish as to complain about the taxes I pay.  They seem appropriate to me given our incredibly privileged position.  However, I do find it disturbing to think of myself as occupying the very top tier of federal tax payers on a percentage basis.  In what kind of universe does someone with my family income pay roughly twice the percentage of taxes paid by the likes of Warren Buffet or Bill Gates?

As Sam Pizzigati points out in the linked article, the 16.6% federal tax rate in 2007 was almost half of the 29.9% of income in federal taxes that the top 400 paid in 1995, and a far cry from the 51.2% in income paid as federal taxes by the top 427 families in 1955.  In other words, the federal taxes assessed against the ultra rich have been cut by almost 70% since the middle of the Eisenhower era. (The 1955 tax rate would have brought in an additional $47.7 billion in tax revenue in 2007, a not inconsiderable sum.)  

The notion that we as a society cannot levy greater taxes on the super rich is absurd.  These people earned in one week a sum sufficient to set up comfortably any person for the rest of his or her life.  It seems to me that we could tax them at a rate such that they would have to work two weeks before achieving lifetime security.     

George Will Continues To Lie About Climate Change

George Will's latest column about climate change largely consists of gloating over the world's failure to act about it.  I guess that's what right-wing hack writers do, and isn't really worthy of comment, other than to note that, his carefully cultivated reputation as an intelligent, reasonable conservative to the contrary, a right-wing hack is all he is.

But he does briefly claim scientific backing for his view that global warming is bogus:

Global warming skeptics, too, have erred. They have said there has been no statistically significant warming for 10 years. Phil Jones, former director of Britain's Climatic Research Unit, source of the leaked documents, admits it has been 15 years. (Link in original.)

So let's click on that link.  Here's what we find:

[BBC] - Do you agree that from 1995 to the present there has been no statistically-significant global warming

[Jones] Yes, but only just. I also calculated the trend for the period 1995 to 2009. This trend (0.12C per decade) is positive, but not significant at the 95% significance level. The positive trend is quite close to the significance level. Achieving statistical significance in scientific terms is much more likely for longer periods, and much less likely for shorter periods.

So the reason " there has been no statistically significant warming" for 15 years is that you wouldn't expect significance over such a short period of time to begin with. 

By analogy, suppose you had a weighted coin that landed 'heads' 75% of the time.  If you flipped it 15 times and got 11 heads - a perfectly normal result for that coin - your evidence that it was weighted wouldn't be significant at the 95% level, because there's a 5.9% chance that you could get 11 or more heads in 15 flips by sheer dumb luck.  You'd need more flips to demonstrate that the coin was indeed weighted.

Suppose further that you had indeed flipped the coin more times, that you'd flipped it 30 times and gotten 11 heads in the first 15 flips, and another 11 heads in the second 15 flips, for 22 heads in 30 flips altogether.  Your cumulative result showing the coin's bias would be significant at the 95% level, even though neither the first set of 15 flips nor the second set of 15 flips would be significant at that level by themselves.

At the link, Jones provides a table that shows that the warming trend over the 1975-2009 period is significant.  So what he's saying is that we can detect significant warming over the longer period but not over one of the shorter periods that the longer period can be broken down into.  It's exactly the same thing. 

What Will is saying is that it's somehow a problem for the 'coin is weighted' camp that the last 15 flips, taken by themselves, don't show that the coin is weighted.  And that's simply ridiculous.  Those last 15 flips indeed don't show anything by themselves.  But they don't undermine the claim that the coin is biased.  In fact, they support that claim - just not at a level that's statistically significant using a 95% standard.

And, as Jones points out, the same is true of the data for 1995-2009: they support the claim, but not at a level that's significant at the 95% level.

But Will turns this on its head and would have you believe that this is evidence that global warming isn't happening.  He's lying.

Nah, stuff like that *couldn't* happen here!

As I type this, the third headline down on the WashingtonPost.com front page reads, "Banker Feeds Crony Capitalism."

For a second, I thought the WaPo might have done some serious reporting about the banksters working their government connections to their advantage (and our detriment).  Lord knows there's plenty of territory there to cover.

But no: it's about corruption at Kabul Bank in Afghanistan.  Sheesh.

Sunday avoidance therapy: the good, the bad, and the utterly gobsmacking

Sorry seems to be the weariest word: Tiger Woods' apology x 10ⁿ.
For embarrassing all those squeaky-clean sponsors, I guess.
(photo via Gawker)

Let's see...gazillionaire golfer/Alpha male has extramarital affairs = fourteen-minutes of internationally-televised apology.

Former Justice Department lawyer issues legal advice to Bush administration that okayed the wanton massacre of civilians; at first faces disbarment for "violating professional standards", then has infraction downgraded to school report-card-like comment: "(used) poor judgment" = hours and hours of... *crickets*

The OPR report included an exchange between an OPR investigator and Yoo regarding what he referred to as the "bad things opinion," what Yoo felt the President could do in wartime.

"What about ordering a village of [resistance] to be massacred?" an OPR investigator asked Yoo. "Is that a power that the president could legally—"

"Yeah," Yoo said.

"To order a village of civilians to be [exterminated]?" the questioner replied.

"Sure," Yoo said.

But Margolis, who suggested Yoo and Bybee's flawed legal work was due to efforts to prevent another 9/11, dropped OPR's "misconduct" conclusions.

***

It's not all depressing and disheartening news on the legal front, however. I'm pleased to report that in Saudi Arabia, matters are inching toward equality for women. To western sensibilities, this might seem a small step, but I've a feeling that Saudi women are of the mind that any and all movement in this direction is a very good thing:

Saudi Arabia is planning to bring in a new law to allow women lawyers to argue cases in court for the first time.

Justice Minister Mohammed al-Eissa said the law was part of King Abdullah's plan to develop the legal system.

The law - to be issued "in the coming days" - would allow women to appear in court on family-related cases, including divorce and child custody.

At the moment, they can only work behind the scenes in government and court offices.

The new legislation will also allow Saudi women to complete certain procedures without the presence of a witness.

***

Walking tall with heavy hearts and even heavier shoes: British models mourn the passing of Alexander McQueen and stand up for Haiti, raising £1 million for relief efforts in a single evening while showing off pieces from the brilliant and troubled designer's final collection.

***

Did you really need a scientific excuse for grabbing your favorite blanket and curling up by the fire for spell? I didn't think so. But here's one anyway:

A nap during the day doesn't just beat tiredness, but actually improves the brain's ability to absorb new information, claim US scientists.

Volunteers who slept for 90 minutes during the day did better at cognitive tests than those who were kept awake.

The results were presented at a conference in California.

A UK-based expert said it was hard to separate the pure "memory boosting" effects of sleep from those of simply being less tired.

The wealth of study into the science of sleep in recent years has so far failed to come up with conclusive evidence as to the value of a quick "siesta" during the day.

The latest study, from the University of California at Berkeley, suggests that the brain may need sleep to process short-term memories, creating "space" for new facts to be learned.

"Sleep not only rights the wrong of prolonged wakefulness, but, at a neurocognitive level, it moves you beyond where you were before you took a nap," said Dr Matthew Walker, UC Berkeley.

Study, schmudy--next time, just ask a cat.
It's not for nothing I'm called the King of the Jungle.

-- Marley Salvatore Tornello

Testing, testing

I am a competent user of computers.  

The revolution of revolution, and the rewriting of its violent and tragic symphony

"The Revolutionist is a doomed man. He has no private interests, no affairs, sentiments, ties, property nor even a name of his own. His entire being is devoured by one purpose, one thought, one passion - the revolution. Heart and soul, not merely by word but by deed, he has severed every link with the social order and with the entire civilized world; with the laws, good manners, conventions, and morality of that world. He is its merciless enemy and continues to inhabit it with only one purpose - to destroy it."

-- Sergey Nechayev, nihilist from The Other St. Petersburg, in his 1869 tome Catechism of a Revolutionary. Nechayev--and his deeply fascinating and frightening story--represent the earliest record of a non-state-directed individual or group encouraging, and engaging in, terrorism* as the word is currently defined.

***

"I felt like putting a bullet between the eyes of every Panda that wouldn't screw to save its species. I wanted to open the dump valves on oil tankers and smother all the French beaches I'd never see. I wanted to breathe smoke."

-- The Narrator in Fight Club (played by Edward Norton), which 1999 movie was based on Chuck Palahniuk's similarly-titled novel, itself a catechism of a revolutionary.

***

"Sadly, though I spent my entire life trying to believe it wasn't so, but violence not only is the answer, it is the only answer. The cruel joke is that the really big chunks of shit at the top have known this all along and have been laughing at, and using this awareness against, fools like me all along.

I saw it written once that the definition of insanity is repeating the same process over and over and expecting the outcome to suddenly be different. I am finally ready to stop this insanity. Well, Mr. Big Brother IRS man, let's try something different; take my pound of flesh and sleep well."

-- Joe Stack, software engineer, in an online suicide note. On February 18, 2010, Stack is alleged to have intentionally crashed a plane into an Austin, Texas building that housed the local offices of the Internal Revenue Service.

***

* ter·ror·ism
Pronunciation: 'ter-&r-"i-z&m
Function: noun
1 : the unlawful use, or threat, of violence, especially against the state or the public, as a politically motivated means of attack or coercion (from Merriam-Webster's Dictionary of Law, © 1996)

We can't live in fear.  Certainly most of us can't, not every minute of every day; the angels and warriors among us, well, they simply refuse to live that way at all. For the rest of us, though, it's a feeling we know well, even as we also live with those omnipresent and self-imposed reminders that there are things we need to get done. At some point, in short, you have to commute to work and wash the dinner dishes and carry out whatever quotidian tasks you need to carry out in order to maintain the reasonably smooth rhythm of being alive. The time for heeding those noisy demons will be later, when you're under the covers--after the children are soothed to slumber and before the camomile tea or Xanax has kicked in.

Despite the numbing agents and the partial deafness of sleep, the drumbeats of fear are always there, aren't they? Sometimes, for some people, they're too loud to ignore. The drums will mingle with the cacophony of Righteous Anger's string section; then, Helplessness and Despair will add their insistent percussion. And all the while, Media and Culture take turns conducting: there they are, standing at the fore and waving their arms, keeping the strange and horrible symphony going (and going and going).

Terrorism is not the act of a single religion or race or ideology. I submit it is a form of mental illness, an inability to drown out the unbearable; an insufficient supply of Reason's calming balm; an injured or incapacitated frontal cortex; a twist of mind wherein a murderous or destructive impulse overrules the survival instinct so vital to man and species alike.

Restoring harmony--achieving it in the first place, really--will require hard, detail-intensive work on the part of every player.

But first and foremost, we must hold accountable the ones who conduct these violent symphonies-in-situ from their vast electronic podiums; we must point to the men and women with the flailing batons and say, J'acuse. We must fire or replace them; or else, ignore them. After all, they need us more than we need them.

And then, we must do the work. We must address the music in front of each of us, and study its past and present, paying close attention to the clues and tiny directions scribbled in history's margins, and strive to learn--to make, and to make better. We must shun the opportunists and instead share our insights with one another, ever mindful of improving everything for everyone, not just a politically powerful few. And despite rancor and discord and walkouts and tantrums--despite the impulse to destroy that ingnites and often burns away relentlessly in the soul of every creative being when he fails--we must resolve to try, try again.

What we cannot do--what we must not do--is live in fear. And we cannot expect anything good to come from fear's never-ending deployment by the morally bankrupt, the despairing, and the despotic.

Also at litbrit.

A Song from Senator Mellencamp

"Human Wheels" - John Mellencamp (D. Indiana)

My favorite Mellencamp song -- undeservedly obscure for some reason. 

This land today, shall draw its last breath
And take into its ancient depths
This frail reminder of its giant, dreaming self.
While I, with human-hindered eyes
Unequal to the sweeping curve of life,
Stand on this single print of time.

I always loved the phrase "with human-hindered eyes -- unequal to the sweeping curve of life." 

With his terrific band, including drum god Kenny Aronoff, whom I have had the pleasure of seeing with both Mellencamp and Marshall Crenshaw.  (He was a little too powerful for Crenshaw at times.) 

Anyway, I suspect that Mellencamp would be a better senator than Brad Ellsworth.  However, I also get the sense that he has a very low bullshit quotient, which can't really make the Senate seem very attractive.   

Mellencamp for Senate?

I think I could get behind that.

I can't say I've followed John Mellencamp's career in recent years.  But as the link says, "Despite a long career as a hitmaker, Mellencamp has kept a low profile in recent years. He has not toured and is releasing albums that are more folk in tone and politically charged."  (Emphasis mine.)

Given the sort of stuff he was writing in his heyday back in the 1980s, he sounds like exactly the sort of guy we need in the Senate, if he could stand that sort of life for a few years.  And he's easily one of the most popular guys in his home state of Indiana.

Here's an excerpt from "Empty Hands" off his amazing 1987 Lonesome Jubilee album:

In the shadows of the smokestacks
Through the black snow that lay on the land
Walked home one winter morning
With my life's savings in my hand
Maryanne, she's fixin' up some breakfast
Got the lights on, on the Christmas tree
Sittin' there lookin' up at an angel
With something dyin' inside of me

Grew up with great expectations
Heard the promise and I knew the plan
They say people get what they deserve
But Lord, sometimes it's much worse than that
Maryanne she's takin' in some laundry
I got a part-time job at a drive-in stand
Oh Lord, what did I do
To deserve these empty hands

Across the cities, across this land
Through the valleys, and across the sand
To many people standin' in line
Too many people with nothin' planned
There's too many people with empty hands

I could deal with a few more Senators who occasionally remember that, when times get rough, they get especially rough for ordinary people struggling to get by.  If Mellencamp hasn't forgotten that - and it doesn't seem like he has - then the Indiana Democratic Party could do a lot worse than to beg John Mellencamp to be their Senate candidate this year.

UPDATE: In response to litbrit's query, here's the Draft Mellencamp website.  It's pretty bare-bones at present, but it's got a link to a petition to the Indiana Democratic Party and some other doodads.

The Mount Vernon Statement - Jefferson (and Tom Hayden) Need Not Worry

Sorry for the lack of posting, but I've been trying to find something to say that doesn't seem unduly repetitive or obvious.  It seems to me that in assessing the current political environment, it is difficult not to keep returning to the same themes over and over -- that is hard not to continually recapitulate that 1) the Democrats lack balls; 2) the Republicans lack brains; and 3) the electorate needs to wake the fuck up and pay attention to what is actually happening here.  It's theme two that interests me here, particularly in light of the unveiling today of the "Mount Vernon Statement" by conservative "thinkers."  

I am struck by the unbelievably banal nature of the statement, its utter vacuity -- it reads a bit like a high school text book extolling the wisdom of the founding fathers.  There is the all important attempt -- from a right wing point of view -- to link the Declaration of Independence to the Constitution, since the former document references the "Creator" whereas the document that actually sets forth our system of government is decidedly and embarrassingly silent on the subject of god.  The overarching concept seems to be one of "Constitutional conservatism," a term that is resolutely devoid of substance. 

Then there is the awkward, contradictory, and decidedly uninspirational rhetoric of the statement:

Some insist that America must change, cast off the old and put on the new. But where would this lead -- forward or backward, up or down? Isn't this idea of change an empty promise or even a dangerous deception?

So change is bad, we must embrace the virtuous status quo at the risk on not knowing up from down, yin from yang, or our collective asses from a hole in the ground. But wait, evidently we do need change, urgently, even:

The change we urgently need, a change consistent with the American ideal, is not movement away from but toward our founding principles. At this important time, we need a restatement of Constitutional conservatism grounded in the priceless principle of ordered liberty articulated in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.

So this left me thinking, which aspects of ordered liberty are our conservative brethren suggesting we move toward?  The right of the President to unilaterally declare war?  Or to indefinitely detain an American citizen without charge or trial?  The right to torture?  To engage in warrantless wiretapping?  To engage in preemptive warfare against nations that have neither attacked nor threatened us? 

But then it occurred to me that a return to founding principles would be completely congenial to our right wing visionaries -- a return to a world in which the franchise is reserved to white, propertied males, where slavery is not only permitted but enshrined in the Constitution, where there is no federal income tax, no right to elect senators by popular vote, no equal protection clause, and no pesky women or blacks to spoil our perfect polity.  And suddenly it all made sense.   

(Compare the flat, superficial tone of the Mount Vernon Statement to the Port Huron Statement, the classic Sixties Manifesto by the Students for a Democratic Society.  Also, the phrase "movement toward our founding principles" just kept reminding me of Ian Kershaw's description of the governing principle of the Third Reich as "working toward the Fuhrer.")  

Bravo to the Blogfather! Ezra Klein is Newsweek's newest scribe

Everyone please join me in raising his glass and shouting a hearty Cogitamus cheer for our friend and "blogfather", Ezra Klein, who'll soon be contributing his wisdom and wonkery to Newsweek magazine.  As you'd imagine, we're more than a little bit proud of Ezra:

Klein has signed on as a Newsweek contributor and will write a biweekly column for the print magazine. He's also expected to write features and online content for Newsweek.

That's in addition to his already prolific writing for the Post, from daily blogging to Outlook pieces. (Klein's Newsweek column will also run in the Post).

As most of you already know, many of the original Cogitamus authors, including Yours Truly, were once guest authors at Ezra's original blog.  We liked and respected each other's work so much--and got along so well--that when Ezra moved into the spotlight, we decided to form this little blog and keep our Not Organized Political Selves and Opinions together, come what may.  So we shall thank him, too.

BRAVO e grazie, Ezra!  BRAVISSIMO!

Trees, Acorns, Phonies, and Grifters

Evan Bayh got the kind of attention he craves today.  Hopefully for the last time in his wretched, worthless life.  As Matt Yglesias has pointed out with great verve today, Bayh is a shallow narcissist, whose sole guiding principle throughout his tepid career has been what's best for Evan Bayh. In announcing his retirement, Bayh has shown the same commitment to his constituents and his party that he demonstrated during his two terms  in office, in which he opposed the repeal of the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy, supported huge cuts to the estate tax for the wealthiest Americans, and, of course, was the most rabid supporter of the Iraq War among Senate Democrats.   

I am not happy that Bayh's seat may well be lost to the Republicans in 2010 -- I am not a fan of Pyrrhic victories.  But I must say, his departure from public life is not a loss to the Republic.  He is nearly the worst of the DLC scum we have had to endure these many years and ultimately, won't be missed.

(Yglesias highlights one of those absurd, "only in the Village" columns by Charles Lane touting Bayh's ability to challenge Obama in the presidential primaries in 2012.  Yeah, I'm sure Dems will be clamoring for a challenge to Obama from the right.  "Evanescence" could be the "Joementum" of 2012.) 

The younger Bayh is a stark contrast to his father, Birch, who served for three terms in the Senate, winning elections in 1962, 1968, and 1974, before finally succumbing to the Reagan landslide in 1980.  Birch Bayh was a serious and accomplished liberal senator, the father of Title IX, the author of the 25th and 26th amendments to the Constitution (presidential succession and the 18 year old vote respectively), the lead sponsor of the Equal Rights Amendment, and an amendment to abolish the electoral college.  He was the first candidate I ever supported for President, handing out leaflets for him as a 16-year old in Massachusetts during the 1976 primary.  (He finished 7th, which pretty much set the course for my political lifetime.)  Birch Bayh made the most of his time in the Senate as a passionate champion of a fully democratic, fully participatory society.

Unfortunately, the only thing that Evan Bayh seemed to absorb about his father's career was his loss to Dan Quayle in 1980.  Hence, a career in which he never challenged the powerful or the conventional wisdom, a legislative life of precious little importance, while his wife shamelessly whored for health care giant Wellpoint and other corporations, making millions for the Bayh family for doing God knows what.

But hey, that's what the DLCers are all about.  Real Democrats decry corporate greed and malfeasance.  DLC-types say hey, where can I get me some of that.  The Republicans, alas, do not have a monopoly on grifters. 

Which leads me to the one DLCer more shameful than Evan Bayh -- Harold Ford, Jr.  Recent revelations that Ford does not pay taxes in New York while working on Wall Street should not only be the death knell of his joke of a campaign for New York Senate, it should also prompt a criminal investigation.

As anyone who reads this blog knows, I have been a proponent of pragmatic coalition building to advance progressive ends.  It appears that such efforts are likely to end in failure as a result of the Bayhs and Fords and Nelsons and Landrieus of the world.  If we are to ever succeed in advancing a genuine liberal/left program, we are most likely going to have to start from the ground up in places like Indiana and try to develop a younger generation of genuinely liberal political talent and try to win this battle in the long run.   

Sunday avoidance therapy: On Love, Tina Fey, Frank Zappa, and the First Amendment

Happy Sunday, and Happy Valentine's Day, everyone!

In Escondido (Spanish for "hidden"), love (and chocolate) is in the air. And in Lincoln, MA, love is in the garden:

Two Big Black Hearts, by Jim Dine (American, b. 1935)
at the DeCordova Museum and Sculpture Park, Lincoln, MA

-----

Presidents, senators, governors, and half-governors have long been parodied by the talented comedians of Saturday Night Live, none of whom has attracted voluminous quantities of hate mail and threats like actor, writer, and producer Tina Fey, famous for her spot-on portrayal of the ex-governor of Alaska, Sarah Palin. Ironically (which is part of the problem with Palin's fans, right there), Fey would often only recite, verbatim, the very words Palin herself uttered. So this part of the interview with Fey for the upcoming issue of American Vogue was disheartening to read (H/T Bree):

[...] She also bought a "little house" in the country, but she won't say where, because "I don't want anyone to come there and try to kill me." Ever since her devastatingly funny Sarah Palin impressions, she has for the first time in her life attracted unwanted attention—and hate mail. "People started projecting politics onto me," she says. "There are people who hate me now because of that." Fey's parents are Republicans, and she herself is an Independent. "The partisan nature of politics continues to appall me. I'm almost paralyzed by my inability to see things in black-and-white. I encountered a lot of hard-core Democrats who are just as rabid and hateful, and I found that just as shocking. It was scary to be in that world of politics. I felt uncomfortable to be in that discussion. The weird thing is, when Darrell Hammond or Will Ferrell or Dana Carvey did an impersonation of a president, no one assumed it was personal, but because Sarah Palin and I are both women and people think women are meaner to each other, everyone assumed it was personal."

-----

I originally posted these at Ezra Klein's blog, back in the day, and given all the recent hullabaloo about doing away with certain perfectly good English words because someone, somewhere might get offended, I thought it might inspire readers--especially new ones who missed this the first time around and who might not be aware of the late Frank Zappa's profound interest in politics and First Amendment issues--to see our hero FZ pointing out the then-nascent rightwing trends ("toward a fascist theocracy", as he aptly described it).

What you're about to see is a video clip--in three parts--of Maestro Zappa appearing on the CNN program Crossfire. Also appearing are On the left! Tom Braden, On the right! Robert Novak, and along with Mr. Zappa--In the crossfire!--is Washington Times columnist John Lofton. Enjoy!

Buffalo Blizzard 1977

Houses buried, roofs collapsed, cars disappearing, people leaving from work and getting home three days later, 29 killed.  Yet Baltimoreans bitching that streets are still being plowed.  Count your blessings, people.  (oh, and turn the volume on for this one)

Analyst points out facts to Bush flunkie who accused Obama of inviting terror attacks; Joe Scarborough:We're going to break right now...

O'Donnell: Isn't it true that the president YOU worked for invited the first attack? You just admitted, "We didn't know who hit us", yet you were TOLD who--before we were hit on 9/11--and YOUR administration invited the first attack, for Which. You. Should. Live. In. Shame.

Fresh off the MSNBC video press is an amazing exchange I witnessed live this morning when Bush speechwriter Marc Thiessen, author of a newly-published book charmingly entitled Courting Disaster: How the CIA Kept America Safe and How Barack Obama Is Inviting the Next Attack (the Amazon page of which I would not link to if you paid me all the chocolate in Switzerland) appeared on Morning Joe to promote his bullshit premise.

Rather than do the usual media-tiptoe around All Things Bushian and allow Thiessen to spew his lies unchallenged, MSNBC senior political analyst Lawrence O'Donnell pinned him down. Throughout the exchange, Thiessen smiled the smug smile of a practiced liar; meanwhile, Scarborough, as usual, attempted to talk over O'Donnell, saying Lawrence, Lawrence, Lawrence! over and over, and eventually cut his mic. At which point, to my surprise and delight, O'Donnell shouted his questions sans mic, and the show then cut to a commercial.

When they returned, O'Donnell was still on air (hey, Son One worried they might have whisked him off to some CIA black site!), his mic restored. Scarborough admonished O'Donnell to "stay in the corner" and sort-of completed the interview, and amazingly, O'Donnell piped up again and asked--after pointing out that Thiessen hails from the wealthiest ZIP codes in America, that he attended a private boarding school with its own golf course and then Vassar, and that he never served a day in the military--what, exactly, did he (Thiessen) know about torture?

Whoa.

It was must-see teevee and then some. More like this, please, MSNBC.

(If you would like to send a note to the network in praise of O'Donnell's all-too-rare line of questioning, please go here.)

A Must Read for Everyone

John Cole has written a remarkable piece in which he distills the entire American political/media dynamic in one horrible, all-too accurate scenario.

It really captures the essence of our dysfunctional and sad politics and the way in which the media feeds into it, inevitably in a way that the right wing somehow always wins. 

Discouraging, but illuminating.   

h/t to the inestimable Roy Edroso, who has his own rather pithy summary of Cole's piece, while urging everyone to read the original in full.

How About Giving People Jobs?!!

Sweet Jumping Jesus on a pogo stick!! What the fuck is wrong with the Democrats?  Yeah, I know -- we don't have that kind of time. 

Look -- there are two simple things that a jobs bill should do: make direct grants to the states specifically earmarked to preventing layoffs of state employees and have the feds hire people directly for New Deal-like programs.  I would particularly recommend programs aimed at youth unemployment, which in places like DC is hitting astronomical levels, and get something ramped up by summer time.  

Tax credits are a slow and ineffective way to generate jobs.  I would think this would be obvious to everyone.

This country was once defined by its can-do pragmatism and our ability to handle massive tasks with aplomb, whether it be the building of the transcontinental railroad (authorized by Congress in the midst of the Civil War) or the Panama Canal, the massive public works under the New Deal, the extraordinary war time production during World War II, the construction of the interstate highway system, or the Apollo program.  After thirty years of right wing ideological dominance, we seem chronically unable to think big and get things done.  Obama needs to try to change this mind-set.

Really, this shit isn't that complicated.  Put people to work.  If one thing doesn't work, try another, but stop being passive.  And yes, if the Republicans want to filibuster this, let them.  But make sure that the public can understand in a simple sentence or two what is being obstructed.

(h/t Atrios.)  

Winter Wonderfood: litbrit's Turkey and Bean Chili

My boys--including the (sort-of) grown-up one--absolutely love this dish, and I'm happy to make it for them, as it's delicious and warming; it's adaptable to different palates (we like it hot); and nutritionally speaking, it packs a nice wallop of lean protein and fiber while keeping fat and calories to a minimum.

If you're going to keep things healthy, I'd recommend using low-fat (not fat-free, yuck) sour cream and low-fat sharp cheddar as toppings. This will serve about eight adults; if you're cooking for a roomful, as I was during the Superbowl, you can easily double the quantities, too (and leftovers are wonderful for breakfast when added to scrambled eggs in tortilla wraps). Cornbread is the classic accompaniment, whether you make it from scratch, use a pre-fab mix, or send someone to the supermarket bakery.

I want to say I adapted this from one of Martha Stewart's recipes; I'm about 99% certain I found the original version in one of her magazines several years ago. Given the chilly outlook, so to speak, this seems to be the perfect thing to kick off a home-bound weekend. So...let's cook!

You'll need a big, heavy-bottomed stock pot, a sharp knife, a long-handled wooden spoon, and a cutting board.

Ingredients:

* 3 pounds ground (or finely-minced leftover) turkey (if using already-cooked leftovers, I like to use a mix of dark and light turkey; otherwise, buy the fresh ground turkey that's about 7% fat, as the fat-free kind will be too dry.)
* olive oil
* 1/2 sweet onion (i.e. Vidalia or Maui), finely chopped
* 1 head of garlic, peeled and finely minced (note, that says head, not one measly clove! Hey, you need lots of garlic in your life if you're going to ward off heart disease and vampires; besides, garlic is delicious and it sweetens when you cook it.)
* 3-4 large fresh jalapeño chiles, ribs and seeds removed for less heat, minced (wash your hands well before you touch your face or anyone else's, okay?)
* red pepper flakes to taste (we like a lot; start with a pinch or two if you're not sure)
* 3 tablespoons chili powder
* 3 generous rounded tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder (very important!)
* 4 teaspoons ground cumin
* 2 cans (28 ounces each) whole tomatoes in puree (I use the Cento brand)
* 2 tablespoons unsulfured molasses (it might sound counter-intuitive to use something so sweet in chili, but trust me, it all works)
* Coarse salt
* 3 cans (15 1/2 ounces each) best-quality pinto beans, organic if you can find them, drained and rinsed
* 1 cup fresh cilantro leaves, coarsely chopped

Method:

1. Pour a little oil--a tablespoon or two--into your stock pot or Dutch oven and place over medium heat; roll the pan around to coat bottom as the metal warms. Add onions and jalapeños, lower the flame a little, and cook until the onions are beginning to turn translucent; then add the minced garlic and red pepper flakes (again, go easy at first; you can add more toward the end if you want serious fire), and cook until everything is soft, stirring occasionally. Add the ground turkey and break it up with a wooden spoon, cooking and stirring until no longer pink, about 8 to 10 minutes (if using already-cooked leftovers, much less time is needed, obviously; just warm through).

2. Stir in chili powder, cocoa powder, and cumin; cook, stirring, until fragrant, 1 minute. Things will start smelling really good now, and you may notice children, neighbors, cats, and dogs wandering into your kitchen.

3. Break up tomatoes with a spoon or your hands, and stir them in along with the puree. Add molasses, 1 cup water, and 2 teaspoons salt; bring to a boil. Reduce heat to a simmer; cook, partially covered, 30 minutes.

4. Add beans and continue cooking, uncovered, until turkey and beans are very tender, and chili is thick, about 30 minutes more. Stir in the cilantro.  Serve in your favorite ceramic bowls, with some shredded cheese, sour cream, and corn bread on the side.

Enjoy! Stay warm--and stay off the roads.

XXX
D.

My Dog's Schwab's Drug Store Moment

I got interviewed by one of the local news reporters yesterday covering Snowpocalypse. This poor guy was out there for several days for hours at a time.  Stanley and I are interviewed in the first twenty seconds or so.

Of course, Stanley is the star of the encounter.  I am waiting for the offers to start pouring in.

*Schwab's.